Until We Fall
by Distant Voice
Summary: [Set during and post-Fourth Shinobi War. Canon divergence] They say war changes people. Of all things he stands to lose to the war, he hasn't expected that his civility is the first to go. GaaSaku somewhat? (Now a 3-part ficlet. Parts 2 and 3 are up!)
1. Part 1

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.

Rated M for coarse language, morbidness, character deaths, and some sexual content.

 **Until We Fall**

 **Part I**

* * *

"Take it back... what you said. You didn't mean it."

She quietly insists, as she hovers over him. Over the glow of green that engulfs his numb left arm, he can see her twisted face. He is taken aback by the trace of innocence that still remains in her tone and her pout. Disgusted yet oddly amused, he is almost tempted to reach out and pinch her cheek with his other presently less useless arm.

Despite her best efforts, the excruciating pain that currently consumes his body paralyzes him all the same; the invisible wounds afflict him even more. On his back he adjusts his head to face the ashy gray sky, gazing at it without purpose. He remembers the sky from three months ago, different from now; he remembers the golden sun that rose over the edge of the sandy dunes. Suddenly, he misses home.

The blood-curdling screams and cries all around them, his senses adapt to them. They are no more than a buzzing white noise in his background; he can fall asleep to it, he thinks. But she does not allow his consciousness slip away.

 _Naruto is a fucking coward_ , again he tells her without any reservation.

They say war changes people. Whoever came up with that, a _fucking genius_. Of all things he stands to lose to the war, he hasn't expected that his civility is the first to go.

He means it. Every single cruel word out of his bloodied mouth.

At this point in time, he is not at all bothered by the expletives he carelessly throws at her, the one who keeps his life hanging on by a thread.

It is what he believes. He tries to convince her that their friend's death is neither noble nor sacrificial. A martyr, he thinks not. Irresponsible, yes, to accept death so readily before the very eyes of his loved ones. It is the easy way out for _him_ , to leave the sorrow and anguish to his friends to carry in addition as they meet their own demise. _He_ shouldn't have gone before them…

Not only Naruto. All their precious ones, mutilated and slaughtered on the battlefield. The grotesque images sear his mind, the worst kind of torture there is; he wonders if it's the same for her.

Temari, Kankuro, Kakashi, Sasuke, Tsunade… the names of the departed go on like the endless darkness that befalls the earth. He loses track how many they've lost to the mad man. At this rate, it may be easier to count who is still _not_ dead. He laughs darkly to himself. Yet, his body shakes in rage at the thought.

By some ill-humored miracle, he and she are the only ones left alive. For now.

"Hold still," she instructs.

He notices that she decidedly ignores him the second time around, as she concentrates on her work to repair his severely damaged nerves. Her disheveled pink hair lightly flap against her face while she shakes her head, and she attributes his comments to his delirious state from the blood loss.

His eyes refocus on her form, raking her entire body. Beads of sweat roll down the sides of her dirt and blood smeared face. What catches his interest is the black markings that wrap around her exposed skin like serpents. She is drained, with pathetically little amount of chakra left in her reserve. But it doesn't stop her from giving her all to him. Pointless, they both know.

With her abilities, she can only heal so much of him. And he is certain his sanity isn't on the list.

Nonetheless, the thought of her collapsing before he does weighs down on him heavily. He cannot tell if his anxiety stems from his genuine care for her or his selfish desire to avoid a lonesome death.

"Gaara-kun, don't worry. I'm a medic-nin," she speaks as if she reads him like an open book.

He hates the meaningless familiarity that she attaches to his name at this point, as well as the reassurance that she tries to offer. Still, he quirks his brow, unsure what she's getting at with her mumbling statement, _and_ an obvious one at that. He is irked, yet curiosity arises within him.

"...which means, I won't die before you."

How smug of her.

Where has he heard that before? Right, the rules of a medical ninja, so brazenly declared by that slug woman to the world in her last stand against Madara... His pounding head struggles to recall them. Something about the medics being the last members to perish, so to carry out their duties until their comrades draw their final breaths. Hn. A lot of good it did to the Godaime, as she now lies with their allies in pieces before their executioner. Stupid rules, he snorts. As a disciple of the late Hokage, the young kunoichi religiously adheres to her mentor's teachings, it seems. She is still holding on to hope, every last drop of it.

"So…" she trails off. The few seconds of silence that follow fuel his impatience. Spit it out, woman. He urges her with his angry eyes.

Eventually she manages to smile at him, but her tired hollow eyes do not crinkle.

"...when you go, I'll make sure it won't hurt."

She says to him something he does not expect. No, she isn't hopeful; she has gone delusional. It seems she too is fading in and out of her own madness. It sickens him. Something threatens to regurgitate up his throat. Bile or blood, he doesn't know. She is naive to think that she can guarantee a painless end for him. Humanity is lost. And it won't be long before they are torn limbs from limbs, their guts spill, and their bodies become mangled like worthless broken rag dolls.

Her ghostly words have a chilling effect on him. All of a sudden, the realization of their impending destruction is too real. His stomach churns, adrenaline about to rush through his system as a fight or flight instinct. And he suppresses the impulse to take her hand and run, far away from this wasteland ravaged by senseless fighting, far away from the graves they dug for themselves when they entered the war. He dismisses the futile idea.

She needs to stop talking, he decides. Right now.

"Sakura." He strains. With a cracked voice, he directs another crude remark at her:

" _You fucking talk too much._ "

He stuns her once more with his crassness. He does so intentionally to take advantage of the moment that she falls victim to her own uncertainty. She stops short in her task and stares at him with her mouth slightly agape.

Riding on the last bit of his strength, he grabs her by her battered uniform with one hand. Gracelessly, he pulls her in and crushes his cut and bruised lips onto hers. His forcefulness, a reflection of his inner despair.

" _Die, die! All of you! There's no place to run, no place to hide!_ " The maniacal laughter of the deranged killer continues to roar in the distance, growing closer and louder by the seconds.

His heart clenches, but it doesn't make him break their connection. She gives up on her ministration as her hand comes to rest on his chest. When she does not push him away, he smirks against her mouth. Finally. _About time_ they both come to an understanding.

The taste of iron laces their desperate but passionless kiss, soon mixed with warm saltiness. As he closes his eyes and feels moisture on his cheeks, he isn't sure whom the tears belong to anymore.

And so they relish their last breathing moment together.

Because tomorrow is a luxury they can no longer afford.


	2. Part 2

A/N:

So I've actually been working on this sequel here and there since I finished the last part. I'd planned to get these installments out before the end of the summer, but time and inspiration weren't on my side. I finally made the decision to just get this draft out of the closet, dust and finish it, because it's been nagging me in the back of my mind for months. Now that this is out of my system, I can focus better on my other project(s).

I had fun experimenting with this piece in terms of the writing style and format. I hope you all will enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.

 **Part II**

* * *

Seconds, minutes… he knows not how long he has before he meets his fated end. Deep down in his guts, his survival instincts practically scream and beg for him to command his limbs to run, to fight, or to just let _her_ do _her fucking job_... _Anything_ other than what he's doing right now that may allow him a few pathetic seconds more to his doomed existence.

But he steels his mind and doesn't reconsider his decision on how he wishes to take his last breaths before Death comes knocking.

Their kiss is a better moment spent, he thinks, rather than her vain efforts to prolong his life. He'd simply wanted her to shut up. Her paradoxical words and actions were having a profound impact on him, and he didn't need his fear to be fed at a time like this. Though as he continues with the unrefined act, there are flashing seconds that make his original intention blur.

Her lips are soft and pliable, not at all like his chapped and blood-stained ones. There is sweetness in them, unadulterated by the taste of metal and saline; there is promise in them, he finds, of something delightful to come… If only they weren't where they were, being shackled by their sealed destiny in this damned hell on earth, about to be exterminated—He presses his tongue against her mouth. At an insistent push, she lets him delve inside rather easily. Just then the cries of desperation and despair in his background seem to fade just a little.

Right now, he figures if he puts more mind into this, it may just help him become completely numb...

Still, this moment—for which he feels an irrational desire to stretch it into eternity—becomes a fleeting moment, as an acrid voice creeps over them, interrupting and robbing him of those brief minutes of ironic peace.

" _Look what do we have here. Two little love birds._ "

She breaks away from their connection abruptly. A gasp of horror escapes her, and her hand immediately finds his, squeezing it. A surprisingly pleasant warmth blankets his cold digits. A shame that he's not in a time nor place to enjoy it.

The horrific sounds and smells that he'd gone oblivious to earlier come assaulting his senses all at once, as his vision clears to the view before him for a split second before it starts to shake violently.

Before them stands the Grim Reaper in flesh. Evil's reincarnation.

He seethes. Despicable is too kind a term to ascribe to this vile man. And hate is too lenient an emotion to describe how he feels toward him. He feels _so much more_ , as contempt poisons every fiber of his being. Simply killing him is considered a mercy. He wishes nothing more than to shred him into pieces, crush him like a vermin, and decimate him until there's nothing left to bury. And let his tortured screams become music to his ears.

But even then, he knows it will not make himself whole again.

That line of bleak thought, along with the immobilizing pain, is enough to taper the hot rage and fiery defiance in his eyes, causing them to vanish into oblivion. In front of his enemy, the one that took everything from him, he relents through his ragged breaths:

"Just fucking get it over with."

Ironically, for someone who's been entrusted with the lives of tens of thousands of people, he's in no power to dictate his own.

When the last word of his surrender dies out in the wind, the hand that encases his squeezes harder. And he resists the urge to reciprocate, even more so the urge to look at her face. In this moment, there's nothing he can offer her or vice versa; no reassurance, no cold comfort.

" _Too easy and too dull. I have a better idea._ "

Every syllable out of the lunatic's mouth grates on his ears like sandpaper grinding against his eardrums. His body trembles against his will, and he curses himself for it.

" _How about we see which one of you breaks first._ "

The sight of the mad man's sneer causes his innards boil, but the sound of his words makes his blood run cold.

The man's crazed eyes shift back and forth between them both, like a predator seeking its prey. When he settles them on the spot next to him, he grins with malice; amusement dances in his evil glint.

Before he knows it, the warmth in his hand is snatched away. He's too slow to grab it and make it stay a second longer. Time seems to still, while he watches helplessly as she drifts further and further from him until a giant skeletal being ensnares her in its hand.

Then it all becomes a _fucking nightmare_.

His eyes go round with terror at the sight of her writhing in the hold of the monstrous skeletal being. She looks so tiny and fragile, about to snap in two like a twig at the slightest pressure. The tightening of the Susanoo's grip brings about a crunch of bones and agonizing screams. It threatens to devour the little sanity he didn't know he still has left. Her face contorts, her beauty marred by the trails of scarlet that flow down her mouth.

She coughs and chokes on her own blood and tears, as she struggles to mouth something to him. When he makes sense of her message, he breaks.

" _I'm... sorry…_ "

It utterly destroys him.

The guttural screams tear through him and pierce through the thick air. Full of horror, hysteria, fear... _His_ screams, this time.

His eyes widen, bulging from their sockets, but he can no longer see clear. His screams perpetuate, his vocal cords near rupturing, but he can no longer hear his voice. The howling winds drown out his near-inhuman cries.

A tsunami of sand erupts, pulverizing everything in its path and reducing all to dust without discretion, the smell of decay seeps deep within. The sand shrouds the sky, darkens it like midnight. It hurls and slings as it pleases, on its own accord, not restricted by any conscious thought from him. He had none to spare at that point anyway.

The violent waves come crashing down on his foe from every direction and dwarfs him. The smallest trace of surprise registers on the dark-haired man's face, and he's quick to redirect his avatar to his protection. But the ravenous sand seeks out every weak spot in his armor. Beating, crushing, obliterating with unrelenting force.

In the edge of the sandstorm, he lies paralyzed. Not knowing what becomes of the mad man, he's left with the sensation of the savage that the sand wreaks upon his own flesh for the first time. The raging dusts blind him, and the screeching winds deafen him. Millions of grains whip his no longer armored skin raw, tearing into him and close to flaying him. As he basks in this unaccustomed pain, he wishes it upon his enemy, but a thousandfold more...

When the wrath of the storm ebbs, he finally sees... His adversary, strung high in mid-air; only his head remains visible, the rest of him… cemented into a mountain of sand that shapes itself into a colossal form. A figure that resembles a woman; one that's strangely motherly, given the way it cradles the man. Yet, it's an embrace that's meant to smother and kill.

The antagonist leers in spite of his immobility, yet the craze in his ashen face gives way to resignation.

" _Well done, Kid Kazekage, wel_ _—_ " The sand has no tolerance for his speech. It rushes to fill his mouth, his nose, his ears, his every crevice, silencing him until the end of time.

At the sight of the fresh grave, he manages to produce a rueful smirk despite his stiff lead-like jaw muscles, but it quickly evaporates from his face. The void in his soul, unfilled by the gratification of vengeance, is what he will carry with him to hell, so it seems.

As he rests on his own makeshift deathbed from the rubble, he thinks about the parting gift that the deranged man leaves him. A question unanswered: He doesn't know who actually breaks first in Madara's sick and twisted experiment. Everything hurts _just so damn much_. The pain continues to burn and radiate, eating every inch of him like fire ants. When he makes out a blob of pink from the distance, he can't help but feel bitter.

" _...when you go, I'll make sure it won't hurt."_

He's appalled to admit. Fear did get the better of him, and he'd entertained her proposal, as conceived by her own unbalanced mind.

Now he hates that she gave him false hope.

In the end, before the world fades from his vision, all he can do is to keep his angry and disappointing eyes on her unmoving body...

And think about _how she couldn't keep her fucking words_.


	3. Part 3

A/N at the end.

 **Part III**

* * *

 _Am I in hell?_

If that's where indeed where his soul now resides, he finds his initial experience in the netherworld rather… underwhelming. There's certainly no fire and brimstone, no endless wails and screams of torment, no cackling of devils at the tortured souls to welcome him to the afterlife. There's a moment he entertains the possibility that he may have gone to heaven, but he laughs at his folly. With that much blood on his hands? He's sure he has his rightful space reserved in hell ever since his youth.

In the darkness and insufferable silence that envelope him, he stirs in his spot with impatience. If there's anything that feels remotely like it's even on fire right now, it's his throat.

Briefly, he wonders if the countless narratives he's heard about hell have merely been tales from people at their most imaginative.

"Kazekage-sama?"

Finally. Must be the minor demons to escort him to burn on the pyre. Though they're sure as hell polite about it...

" _Kazekage-sama!_ "

The exclamation shakes him more the second time around, vibrating loudly in his ears and instilling subtle awareness in him. Gradually, his brain begins to analyze, as he comes to. The lids that feel like they'd been sewn shut flutter open despite the heaviness, and his sensitive eyes struggle to adjust to the blinding lights pouring into his vision.

He awakes to the sight of several strange faces crowd over the space above him, each peering down at him with concern.

"Am I in hell?" he strains weakly, hearing his own dry cracked voice for the first time.

It's when a string of elated cries from voices he doesn't particularly recognize jars his hearing, his full consciousness returns; and realization dawns on him, one that he finds more chilling than his first thought:

He's alive…

—

In the subsequent days that he spends bound to a sterile room in Suna's hospital, with tubes and lines attached to his body more than he can count, he learns that what was remained of the Allied force had found him. Though his initial bewilderment at his survival is quickly overcome by his shock at the revelation about another patient currently occupying the ICU: The pink-haired kunoichi from the Allies' Medical Division, the late Godaime Hokage's apprentice, his medics inform him. Her consciousness is yet to return, according to them.

They're in awe that he and she came out of the gruesome war alive. _Wrecked_ , but alive. He agrees; they should be dead, both of them. Instead, he lies in his hospital bed and blankly stares at the ceiling, wondering if it's all some sick kind of hallucination.

They then proceed to tell him how she survived her injuries is a miracle; but how he survived his is _by her doing_. From them, he hears that she used the last of her chakra to keep his heart beating until their rescue, admiration in their expressions and tones. It seems that their heroics will be passed down as legends for generations to come. But he feels no glory in their victory, only loss.

The team at the hospital shares with joy that they're able to salvage his left arm and that his physical recovery is progressing excellently, always ending with an unsolicited remark or two about the extraordinary healing abilities of the young kunoichi from Konoha. But he doesn't share their sentiment. He's tired and sick of hearing praises of her. He cannot figure out which is more annoying, the contraption on his arm, or his subordinates. They are just so ignorant. They don't know it's because of _her hypocrisy_ , he's left an empty shell...

They exalt him, as the hero who defeated Madara and saved humanity. But really, all he is now… nothing but a mindless zombie that roams the corridors of the Kage Tower and streets of the Sand village. His advisors may frown in distaste at his profanity and his cavalier attitude, but they let him be. He finds his newfound persona, a product of the war, rather liberating.

They say you never come back from the war the same. Some pieces of him were left on the battlefield that day, never to be recovered. And what did he gain? Scars on his body, and his heart.

His staff alerts him a week before the funeral for The Fallen that _she_ wakes up, but he makes no plans to see her.

—

The first time he sees her is from afar, on the day of The Mourning. Her pink hair bobs in and out of his vision in the crowd. She diligently lays white lilies on each one of the headstones. The lilies, they don't grow in the desert. Where she manages to find them, he doesn't know.

He observes as she recites her silent prayers for every one of the deceased. She suddenly makes eye contact with him, catching him off-guard. She then begins to move in his direction through the mass. He makes himself disappear before she can reach him.

That night and well into dawn he roots himself atop the border wall to wait for the sunrise. When daylight breaks, he sees the same orange orb that stays true to its promise and peeks over the horizon where the golden desert meets the blue sky.

But it's just not the same anymore.

—

The second time he sees her is when she invites herself to his chambers, rather presumptively. She wants to check up on him, she explains.

She looks normal; healthy, even. It's unreal. He doesn't like what he sees. She shouldn't be alive, neither should he.

Unsure how to approach, she stands steps away from him and fidgets with the edge of her short skirt. Her apparel is not suitable for Suna's weather; it reveals too much of her skin, he notes. He curbs the urge to touch her, her face, her shoulders, her arms, her legs, everywhere, to make sure it's not an illusion. He deliberately swipes his eyes from her smooth thighs up to her face, and he doesn't even try to hide his blatant action. She blushes, as she tucks a strand of pink hair behind her ear.

While she hesitates, he decides to make things easier for her.

"Why are you not dead?"

That's the first thing he greets her with in weeks, after their unthinkable ordeal. She frowns at his cold question, but he doesn't intend to work on his social skills anytime soon.

"Gaara-kun—"

He hates the familiarity that she asserts without his assent.

" _Kazekage-sama_ ," he corrects her haughtily.

He uses his authority to keep their distance, to maintain the degree of separation between them. The last thing he needs is to sow some type of attachment for someone who will serve as his constant reminder of the painful wartime memories.

His reason is a load of bull, and deep down he knows it. He does so out of a sense of self-preservation. When the faces of the dead and the images of her torture haunt his dreams at night—and he never used to dream when he did sleep—is when he concludes that he cannot afford to love anyone anymore.

" _Gaara-kun_ ," she insists. He doesn't like that she's stubborn, but he begrudgingly understands. With the suffix, she reminds him of their friendship. And that he's not alone, that he still has her, despite all the loss.

"I'm not a student of the Godaime for nothing."

He hardly listens, still in denial.

"You didn't keep your words."

"Wha- _oomph!_ "

Before she can utter her confusion, he reiterates his statement through his action, as he goes straight for her, slamming her into the wall with his iron grip on her shoulders.

" _I said, you didn't fucking keep your words_."

The harshness in his voice seems to make her wince more than the bruise-inducing pressure from his hands. She doesn't fight back against his aggressiveness. Beneath her furrowed brows, her emerald eyes flicker with puzzlement and wariness, pleading him for an explanation.

He clarifies for her in his gravelly voice, unable to stop himself from digging marks into her skin with his nails.

" _I was dying, but you made me live._ "

There's no appreciation in his tone. No sane person would treat the person that saved his life this way.

" _You think this is so much better?!_ " He continues to challenge her with his angry biting words.

As an inkling of understanding comes to her, she casts her eyes sideways temporarily before bringing them back up to meet his face. For the short moment during which she withholds her reason, she simply stares at him with pity.

Oh how he wishes to claw that look off of her face—

"What I did… you would have done the same."

Her faintest whisper resonates intensely with him, and his tight grasp around her slackens.

He wants to refute her, reject the idea that he has even a grain of hope left in him. But all he can bring himself to say to her is:

" _Get the fuck out._ "

Not even a word of gratitude to his savior. Some grateful person he is.

—

The third time he sees her is when he summons her to his office. To his satisfaction, she shows up despite the run-in between them last time.

Absentmindedly, he toys with a small glass vile in his hand. Along with the movement of his fingers, the small amount of purple-ish liquid within the tube slides from one end to the other innocuously.

"Do you know what this is?" he asks her plainly. The absence of any standard greetings from him is a foregone conclusion.

She shakes her head.

He gives her an unhinged smile, baring teeth. He tells her almost proudly, like a child who discovers a treasure:

"Sasori's poison. The lab kept samples."

The curiosity in her expression gives way to solemnness. She narrows her eyes.

"How much would be enough?"

She doesn't grace his question with an answer. Instead, she steps over to his desk and bends forward to his eye level. Then she surprises him by planting her lips onto his. As he tastes her, he doesn't think twice about her prying the object out of his fingers and depositing it into her pocket.

—

The fourth time he sees her he fucks her senseless in the guest room, and she lets him.

As he pushes himself into her from behind over and over without care, without sympathy, he loses any clarity of mind. He can't remember what's led him to this position, but all he knows is he needs an escape from a new host of demons that wants to take residence inside him. His own dark thoughts will be the death of him, and her disciplined kisses and touches just won't do anymore to keep him afloat.

Then when he cries after the fact is when he begins to grasp just how damaged he is.

"How…" In her embrace, he searches for a reason to justify his continued existence. "How do you do it?"

"It's... what our friends would want for us," she tells him simply, as if it's so obvious, as if it's the one answer to all the questions in the universe.

"Will you stay?" He turns to her in bed. He feels defeated. Fatigued. It's the first time he ever begs anyone for anything. It's unlike him.

She's all that's left for him. He's drowning, and he wants her to be his life jacket.

"Okay…"

She nods, and he buries his head into her warm hold. For the first time in months, years, he feels contentment.

—

The fifth time he sees her he finds out it's the last time in his homestead. It's also the day he finally acknowledges that they've emerged from the war as two very different people.

They're in his bed with sheets tangled all around them. She sits with her knees to her chin, facing the opposite wall of his bedroom. With his head still on the pillow, he massages circles on the small of her bare back. He admires her porcelain skin. Flawless, not even a single scar. The Rebirth Technique truly lives up to its famed reputation.

Without turning, she mutters, "I'm leaving in three days."

Her simple straightforward words shock him. His fingers stop mid-motion.

"The Konoha Council has decided: I'll be appointed as the Rokudaime Hokage at the end of the month," she elaborates before his brain can try to make sense of the news.

"You will, of course, receive an invitation to the inauguration ceremony," she says matter-of-factly. The neutrality in her tone stings him.

Dropping his hand back to his side, he retreats into his mind. As the successor to one of the legendary Sannin and one who's said to have surpassed her master, she's an apt choice. She deserves it, if nothing else, for her will to live and to move forward.

"That's what you want?" Teeth clenched, he questions her motive.

"I think… it's the right thing to do." She answers him with a non-answer.

He doesn't try to change her mind. He doesn't congratulate her either. Instead he glares into her back with resentment.

In the very end, she still cannot deliver…

"You really can't keep your fucking words, can you."

He wounds her with his harsh remark once more. The muscles in her shoulders visibly tense.

"When it comes to you…"

She relaxes as she quietly speaks, finally looking over her shoulder and down. Her springtime green eyes linger on him softly for a moment before they harden with the kind of resolve that he doesn't think he will forget for a lifetime.

Just then he realizes that he never truly left the battlefield that forsaken day.

But she has:

" _No._ "

* * *

A/N: I don't think I'm the only person who noticed that Sakura says "Gaara-kun" in the anime (and apparently manga too)? I know it doesn't mean much. But as far as I know, the only person she's ever addressed using "-kun" is Sasuke, not even Naruto, so in that context… one can dream, right?

Yeah, I couldn't bear to kill Gaara and Sakura off (typical) even though I pretty much killed off everyone else… but this is not so much of a happy ending either, I guess?

Pssst, I have plans to expand on this and make it a multi-chapter story. I have to admit that I very much like the idea of Sakura as the Hokage. It'll be interesting to see how Gaara and Sakura will interact now as leaders of the two villages.


End file.
